(a) Technical Field
The present invention relates to a system and method for cooling an electric vehicle, and more particularly, to an arrangement for improving efficiency of a cooling system and reducing power consumption by automatically controlling a speed of a fan of a radiator and a driving speed of an electronic water pump.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Generally, an electric vehicle has been developed for the purpose of reducing air pollution and replacing limited fluid energy with a new energy source which drives a motor with power of a battery to assure drivability of a predetermined vehicle speed or more.
The electric vehicle is configured to include a battery which generates electric energy and a motor driving system which supplies electric energy generated from the battery to the motor.
The motor driving system of the electric vehicle is configured to include an inverter, a converter, a motor control unit, a motor, an on-board charger (OBC), power conversion components, etc., in which the power conversion components are equipment which generates high temperature heat, the OBC generates heat at the time of charging and the inverter, the converter, the motor control unit, and the motor generate heat while driving and at the time of operating electronic parts.
The heat generation adversely affects performance and lifespan of the power conversion components and therefore includes a cooling system to solve a problem of heat generation.
As the related art, there are technologies of determining an output flow rate value of an electronic water pump using a plurality of temperature sensors in electronic devices and preventing insufficient cooling of the electronic devices, controlling an operation of an electric pump using a motor control unit, controlling an operation of the motor to disperse a load applied to the existing main control unit, and when the electric pump is not controlled by the motor control unit, controlling the electric pump using the main control unit.
Existing technologies provide cooling control but do not consider a problem of increasing power consumption due to overcooling.